A customer recently wrote:
“I just have to say how thrilled I am with the SnapWords™ cards! I just figured out my 6-year-old daughter is a right-brained and visual learner. We have been using sight word flash cards for about a year with the curriculum we are using and she was just 'not getting it.' The words were not soaking in. We would drill the flashcards over and over and she'd memorize a few of them, but when I would show her the same words in the context of a reader, she would act like she had never seen the words. I was starting to get so frustrated and then I happened upon your website and saw the SnapWords™ cards. I ordered all of them and I just can't believe how quickly my daughter is now 'getting it'! It's as if a light bulb has been turned on in her head! We are already almost through the first set and usually I just have to show her the side with the drawing only once and she has it! I am AMAZED! And now, she is picking those words out in the books we read together. It's as if her mind takes a snapshot of the drawing side and then it's easy! Even later in the evening when we're reading books and she sees one of those words, she will actually say the little saying on the back of the card and I can tell she is visualizing the card and then the word appears in her mind. AMAZING! Thank you so much. I am so glad I discovered the SnapWords™ cards!”
--Cindy
We were thrilled to get this email because it bears witness to what we believe about how right brained learners (including visual learners) take in information and how they process and use that information. We have known for a lot of years that teaching details in isolation is not best practice, but for right brained learners or visual learners, details to memorize in isolation should be taboo. It just doesn’t produce results for them.
Cindy makes several significant points:
- They had been using flashcards printed with plain words for learning sight words. The problem with teaching sight words in this fashion is that details are being taught in
isolation and without a context. So learning depends solely on the child’s ability to memorize isolated details. In essence we are saying to the child, “Look at this word. It says GROW.” Then we show another word and tell the child what it says and ask him to remember it. The focus is on the child looking at the combination of letter symbols and remembering what the word is. There is no depth to this type of study. No meaning is conveyed. And when the focus is on the recognition of the word only, the child will focus her attention on how the word looks and not be thinking about what it means.
- They drilled with the cards over and over again. This is standard practice. The assumption is that repetition will eventually produce results. We as teachers are delighted when learning comes easily and rapidly to our students. Some children find it easy to just remember what a word says. Others benefit from repetition for a time. But for many, many children, repetition is just not effective. Right brained learners learn all at once like snapping a picture with their minds. If the camera didn’t flash the first time, it won’t on the 10th or 25th time either, and all it produces is exhaustion and discouragement for both teacher and child.
- “It's as if a light bulb has been turned on in her head!" Drill is not the answer to a struggling right brained learner. When we find a way to deliver learning in the way a child can receive it, the lights DO go on! In teaching and learning the old saying “If at first you don’t succeed, try, try again” should never become the motto. If we teach a concept a certain way and it does not penetrate the child’s understanding, let’s not just teach it the same way in a little more detail, a little more slowly, and a little more loudly. If it did not work the first time, it will not work the next 5 times either. If the first pass through the lesson doesn’t produce good results, we need to reevaluate what is going on. Then we need to utilize a vastly different approach.
- I LOVE the part of the email that talks about how after one pass through the stylized
words her daughter usually knew the words. SnapWords™ cards have a visual embedded in each word that conveys what the word says, but more than that, the visual shows what the word means at a glance, taking the child far beyond simple word recognition and into comprehension and usage of words. The sentence on the reverse puts the word in a context that adds depth of meaning to the word.
- It is also significant that in the process of recalling a word, Cindy's child would reach into her memory and recall not just the word, but also the context. That is what reading is really all about – the meaning the words convey. This right brained learner was using her ability to remember pictures to recall the words that were embedded in those visuals.
So many of us have believed at one time or another that children who learn more slowly with traditional approaches to teaching are just not as quick or capable as their peers. But in reality, the difficulty doesn’t lie with the learner but rather with how we deliver the concepts we want children to learn. Details in isolation, conveyed only through symbols (such as letters and numbers) will never be as effective as material that is rich in visuals that communicate the meaning and context of the lesson.
If you'd like to try the cards with your own students/children, download and print free sample SnapWords™ cards.
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